Leon exited the magic power generator room—he couldn’t think of anything else to call the place—with Justin still limply slung over his shoulder.  A part of him was still demanding that he set Justin down and do as the man asked, to kill him before Valeria could find them, but by now, that part of him was growing smaller and weaker with every step he took.

For his part, Justin didn’t argue when Leon picked him up.  He didn’t even struggle.  Perhaps that was because of his extreme weakness, but Leon had a feeling that it was more than that; Justin was accepting his fate, despite arguing against it only a few minutes before.

Leon wasn’t in too much of a hurry to get him to talk right now.  There would be time enough for that later when they secured their position here, or even after they got back to the other side of the Forest of Black and White.  This place was still technically Nestor’s, and Leon had no idea if there were other surprises waiting for them.

However, it did occur to him that he had a good resource to ask.

[Ancestor,] Leon said, hoping the Thunderbird was listening.  His hopes were founded, and a moment later, the Thunderbird responded.

[Is there something you need, Descendant?  Maybe some advice on how to get that man on your shoulder to talk?]

[No, that I think I can handle on my own,] Leon replied, wondering just how much Justin would resist his questioning if Valeria were to join in.  [I was actually wondering if there was anything else that might be here that I should keep an eye open for.]

[I have little idea what is kept here, your guess would be as good as mine,] she replied.  [However, I suppose if you found the storage crystal for the magic that powers this place, it might be useful to grab.  Who knows what you might be able to do with such a thing?]

Leon glanced around at the walls of the facility.  This far down, there was little decoration, but he could still sense a monumental amount of magic power flowing through the walls.  If he could access that power for his enchanting work, then he figured he might be able to accomplish a great many things…

More than that, his mind drifted back in the direction of the room where he and Nestor first met.  That moon stone was still down there, assuming Nestor didn’t move it for some reason after seizing Leon’s body, along with Leon’s blade, if that strange feeling he had of its location wasn’t inaccurate.  However, if Leon could trust anything that Nestor told him, he thought it safe to trust the older man when he said that the moon stone was dangerous beyond reckoning.  Taking such a thing into his soul realm, where Leon was most vulnerable, wasn’t something he was keen on doing.

But then, something else occurred to him, something that he knew Xaphan might not be too happy about.

[Maybe I’ll leave this place relatively intact,] he reluctantly stated.  [I don’t know if you were there to see it, but there’s something here that Nestor obviously believed was worthy of great magics used to secure it: a fragment of the local moon, or so he claimed, which outputted a great amount of light magic.  Nestor told me that it was his study of this thing that left him too infirm to respond to his father’s call to arms way back then.]

[Interesting.  Take me there, I am intrigued and wish to see this thing for myself.]

Sensing something in the Thunderbird’s voice, Leon asked, [Do you recognize this description?]

[It strikes a vague chord within me,] the Thunderbird said.  [However, there are many things it might be.  No use speculating when it’s practically right there, though.  Take me there and I have no doubt that I’ll know what it is.]

[I’ll do that, then.]

Leon smiled as he walked down the hall, looking forward to what was to come next.  He had Nestor, he had Justin, and in the ideal scenario, he’d be walking away with a tremendously powerful artifact, and possibly as many as two great storage crystals for magic power, for he intended to visit Xaphan’s prison on his way back south.  The place had still been powered when he’d left, and given its age and the fact that it no longer had to hold Xaphan prisoner anymore, he believed that the few years since had not been enough to drain what remained of its power.

With all that had happened over the past couple of days, he knew that he couldn’t rely solely upon his own power, no matter how potent it was.  He had to augment it with other things if he wanted to accomplish all that he wanted to do, and these facilities were like ripe apples just waiting to be picked, as far as he was concerned, even if the Thunderbird Clan had taken almost everything that had any value.  It wasn’t like these places were going to be getting up to anything else ever again, so he might as well take what was left.

As he walked, he heard something that broke him out of his thoughts: a loud clanging sound from the other end of the hall, coming from the lift as far as he could tell.  He felt a brief burst of panic as he thought that maybe Nestor had sabotaged something before he was beaten, and he started running over with little care paid to Justin’s comfort.

However, as he ducked into a nearby alcove to set Justin down, he heard the doors to the lift slide open.

‘Golems?’ he wondered as he began to channel his magic, the absence of his family’s sword felt quite keenly as his fingers curled on nothing but air.  His heart began to hammer away in his chest with suddenly spiking anxiety; for all that was happening right now that demanded his attention, he knew that he would never properly relax until that weapon was returned to his hand.

Leon flooded the hallway with his magic senses as he prepared himself for a fight.  However, as he saw who exited the lift and were making their way down the hall, he relaxed as much as he was able, smiled, and bent back down to pick Justin up again.

A moment later, he ducked out of the alcove with Justin back over his shoulder and ran almost right into Maia and Valeria, both of whom practically jumped out of their skin as he showed himself.

He saw immediate relief cross over both of their faces, but a moment later, their guards went up as Valeria demanded, “Who are you?!”

“I’m Leon,” he replied, suddenly realizing that they must’ve run into Nestor.  He had to fight an immediate urge to descend into his soul realm to smash the ruby imprisoning the man and letting his magic body fade away, ending the man properly.  “I assume, then, that you ran into Nestor while he was in my body?”

Valeria nodded, though she didn’t lower her weapon.  Maia, on the other hand, let her aura fade and her posture soften as she stared at Leon.

[It’s… really you?] she whispered into his mind.

By this point, their connection wasn’t too strong, but it was enough for Leon to respond.

[Yes,] he replied, giving her a loving smile and holding out his free hand.

Maia wasted no time rushing over to take it, and as soon as their skin touched, their connection, which had been slowly healing by itself, was instantly mended, flooding both with the other’s emotions.  They stumbled a bit under the sudden onslaught of emotional information, but it wasn’t anything they weren’t used to, so they straightened up a moment later with Maia resolutely certain that Leon was who he said he was.  She pulled him in closer and pressed her forehead against his.

However, when she did this, Justin shifted in his grasp, showing Valeria just who Leon was carrying.

Her glaive dropped to the ground as her expression fell into something that resembled both relief and horror.  She didn’t scream, but it looked like she wanted to.

Leon pulled away from Maia, his smile fading, and said to Valeria, “I found him.  He’s alive.”

Valeria’s relief at seeing her father was short-lived, quickly replaced with concern and worry at seeing the state of him.  There wasn’t much time for a long reunion, though, as Leon had to quickly explain what had happened to him while he was gone and Nestor’s current state, during which time all four managed to reactivate the lift and head back up to the first comfortable room that Valeria and Maia had found that hadn’t also been completely wrecked.

Once there, Justin was laid down to rest, for he had fallen unconscious not long after reuniting with Valeria.  Whether it was out of shame, guilt, or plain old exhaustion and pain, Justin hadn’t said a word to her the entire time he was awake.  In fact, it seemed almost as if he were avoiding her gaze, though since he was slung over Leon’s shoulder, Leon wasn’t really able to confirm that.

Valeria herself didn’t say much, either, and Leon wasn’t of a mind to force anything.  Once Justin was set down on a comfortable sofa, though, he, Valeria, and Maia were able to have a conversation.

“So,” he said as he straightened up, “I still have some business to conduct here, but it shouldn’t take too long.  Naiad, will you come with?”

Maia glanced at him with a questioning look on her face, but she nodded her agreement.

Leon nodded back, then turned to a slightly confused Valeria and asked, “Can you watch over your father?  It would probably be best for his recovery if he didn’t move too much…  You two should be fine, I don’t think there are any more defenses in this place that would pose you any threat.”

His words were innocuous enough, but they carried with them several implications that gave Valeria some rather obvious pause.  Leon understood what he was saying, though, and gave her all the time she needed.

After several long seconds, she said, “I’ll keep watch over him, we’ll still be here when you come back.”

Leon met her gaze and held it, trying to communicate everything he was feeling with his eyes alone.  From the way her cheeks slightly reddened and the single step she took toward him, he felt like he got across at least the gist of what he wanted to.

“There are a few things in this place that I want to check out before leaving.  Shouldn’t take too long, a few hours at the most.  Unless something comes up before then, we’ll be able to leave before the day is out…  Actually, it’s probably getting late, it might be better if we stay the night and leave in the morning.”

The three agreed, and Leon and Maia left the room, leaving Valeria alone with her unconscious father.

The two were silent as Leon set a leisurely pace back to the lift.  It was a fairly awkward and tense silence, and one that Maia eventually broke as they entered the lift.

[Is it entirely wise to leave her like that?]

Leon, as he examined the lift controls to try and figure out a way to get it to go back down to Nestor’s lab, replied, [Maybe.  Those two have much to talk about, I’d think, and I trust her not to run away.  Do you think she will?]

As Leon began playing with the enchantments that controlled the lift in much the same way that Valeria had when she opened the doors, Maia said after a brief, thoughtful pause, [No, I think she’ll stay.]

[You sound confident of that,] Leon said as he pried off the control panel after a brief search.  [You also sound like you don’t totally hate her.  How bad did things get while I was gone that your attitude has changed so much so quickly?]

[Things were bad,] Maia admitted, though she adopted Leon’s more casual tone and down-played the violence that she and Valeria had experienced together.  [We fought many golems, enough that I wonder if there are even any more in this disgusting pit.]

[We’ll have to see,] Leon replied as the lift finally started to move down.  [While we’re at it, I want to see if there are any intact golem assemblies down here.  Given who was in charge here, I can’t imagine that there aren’t any workshops for creating the things around…]

[Valeria and I found several empty rooms, so things like that might have been taken when the other humans who lived here abandoned it, though many storage chambers that were quite full.]

Leon frowned slightly and said, [Let’s hope that when they took whatever it was they took, they left the assemblies intact.  Even just one would honestly be quite fascinating.  Probably alone it would make the entire trip up here worth it, let alone everything else…]

Leon trailed off as he again thought about what it would mean to have Nestor in his corner, assuming he could ever get the man to talk.  Nestor was without a doubt the best enchanter he’d ever met, and if they could move past all of this, then it would be a great boon for him.  Still, his anger and fury at having been possessed couldn’t be overstated, and it would be a long time before he ever trusted the ghost with anything more substantial than a few questions.

The lift came to a halt on the lowest floor, and, with great caution, Leon and Maia walked out into the hallway.  Fortunately, no golems were waiting in the wings to ambush them, and it was a straight shot to the massive chamber holding the moon stone.  While little had changed, Leon was a little disheartened to see that Nestor had not failed to close the dome of light when he left.

Leon immediately began walking toward it while Maia lagged behind a little bit, her eyes wide with wonder as she took in the sight of the orbiting glyphs and the mirrored floor.

When Leon arrived at the dome of light, he directed his thoughts toward the Thunderbird and asked while hoping she was listening, [Is there… Is there anything you can tell me about this thing?]

The answer was delightfully swift.

[Yes, it’s a robust containment ward designed to keep something from escaping.]  the Thunderbird’s tone was imperious, yet didactic; she was clearly reveling in the chance to teach Leon some more after their training sessions, so recently re-started, had to be postponed for this trip.  [It’s nearly impossible to escape without the correct key so long as the ward remains powered.]

The key Leon knew to be some kind of enchantment that he guessed only Nestor would know, putting it effectively out of reach so long as the ghost remained uncooperative.  However, he latched onto something else the Thunderbird had said.

[So long as it remains powered?] he said.  [Is there any way that we can de-power it?]

[Of course, though it might take some time,] the Thunderbird replied.  [These wards were designed to keep something in, not out.  You’ll also want to consider that we might not be able to get it back up and running again.  Whatever is locked within will without a doubt not be sealed again without serious time and technical knowledge to fix what we’d have to break.]

That gave Leon some pause.  He didn’t think Nestor was lying when he said that the moon stone had poisoned him, so he was leery about leaving it lying around without defenses, but he also didn’t want to take it into his soul realm to keep an eye on it.

Taking a few steps away from the dome, he asked, [There’s a stone in there, Nestor said it was a fragment of the local moon.  It radiates an immense amount of light magic, enough that Nestor said it poisoned him and left him bedridden.  Is this something to worry about?  Shou—]

Before Leon could finish asking his question, he felt the full weight of the Thunderbird’s attention come flooding out of his soul realm and sweep through the chamber.

When she spoke again, her tone was grave.  [I couldn’t get a good look at it, but if I’m right, then that rock has absorbed at least a portion of the power of a Primal God.]

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